A weld cell is an area or room in which welding and related tasks are performed. Tracking activity in the weld cell can be used for a variety of purposes, including helping efficiency, quality, reliability, testing and notifications. This invention relates to tracking welding and/or related tasks and/or welding or related information.
Welding can include a tack weld and a final weld. The performance of a weld can includes time during which the arc is on (arc-on time) and time during which the gun is in hand. In addition to the time-based information of a weld, related weld information includes the weld parameters (current, voltage, process cycle time, ramp rates, etc).
Related tasks can be varied, and include tasks such as grinding and/or scraping for cosmetics fit up and/or spatter removal, loading parts, unloading parts, looking for parts, moving parts, waiting for parts (from another weld or for delivery), and ordering parts. Many of these related tasks are done in an inefficient manner, and many are done by a more highly skilled worker than necessary. For example, welding often requires a high level of skill, but moving parts does not. Other information that can be desirable relates to the operator, such as health and safety information (heart rate, heat stress or core or head body temperature, movement, pinch points (i.e., hands, fingers, toes, feet, etc. . . . ), fume exposure, repetitive motion. It is also desirable to know quality metrics such as Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE), Overall Process Effectiveness (OPE), weld sequence, time spent waiting, and pre-heat, inter-pass and post temperature.
Many companies are pursuing lean manufacturing, six sigma principles, single piece flow, etc., in an effort to improve efficiency. The breakdown of activities of the employee(s) and an understanding of waste and through-put constraints in manufacturing is useful information, particularly for continuous improvement. Reducing or eliminating reducing non-value added bottle necks and activities can improve throughput and overall weld time. Operators often spend more time grinding and fitting parts than welding but data to determine the relative times are not readily available. Given the lack of information and hard data regarding weld cell activity changing production flow is sometimes done as a matter of guesswork, instead of based on hard facts. Data is needed to know when and how to make changes, as wells as to evaluate the result of the change. Such data has been particularly difficult to obtain in a weld cell.
Accordingly, a method and apparatus for tracking well cell activity is desired.